Builds My First Time: FJ40 build (1 Viewer)

[Ryan Towry]

thanks. I think i am going to build her to keep 40's in mind, especially for the snow but i have to run these tires for now. knowing me it will end up on 40's or 42's. kinda the path my first truck took:



definitely need to lower it a bunch but i am going to wait on doing too much on the rear until i get the front 3 link dialed in. in my experience with other builds the front is usually the limiting factor on how low you can go not the rear.

next i want to get the motor and trans bolted together and in the vehicle so i can see where that sits.

I am thinking of selling the 205, minitruck dual cases from my last build and the old 35's and trying to fund a atlas 2 speed transfer case in either the 4.3 or 5.0 to one gear ratio.

 

[Ryan Towry]

well not a bunch of progress but i did get the motor and trans bolted up and in place.

i plan to add the front accessory parts, cross over pipe and fenders/grill to get a good idea of what i am going to need to avoid/ move when building the 3 link.

i bet it will all come out one more time before putting it in for good.

 

[gpfj40]

Nice work so far.

Have you considered mounting the rear shackle upper mount into the frame to lower the rear another 1-2 inches?

There should be room to make the upper mount of the 3 link fit in there on top of the diff. I have spent a lot of time staring at my radius arm set up thinking I should change it to a 3 link, the exhaust is the only thing really in the way, and it could be routed to make it work.

I’m looking forward to the updates!

 

[Ryan Towry]

Nice work so far.

Have you considered mounting the rear shackle upper mount into the frame to lower the rear another 1-2 inches?

There should be room to make the upper mount of the 3 link fit in there on top of the diff. I have spent a lot of time staring at my radius arm set up thinking I should change it to a 3 link, the exhaust is the only thing really in the way, and it could be routed to make it work.

I’m looking forward to the updates!

Yeah i will definitely mount the top of the shackle higher or ditch the shackle all together for a leaf slider setup to help lower it some. i think their is some room to redo the front mount some too to get a little lower. I also need to pull the add a leaf in the pack as well this should also help get the springs flatter. I have always had good luck with very flat spring setups. I plan on waiting to see how low i can get the front and then address the rear to match.

I am hoping to buy some of the FROR keyed flat hi steer arms here shortly and this should be the last piece i need to start cutting and find where i can place the link brackets. i plan to dress the motor as much as possible real quick to help aluminate the problem areas. figure there is no reason speculating until i get the axle under there and see.

stay tuned!

 

[Ryan Towry]

not a whole lot of progress but I did start upping the front suspension for the 3 link:



but now I have to pull the motor to swap out the transmission because this fell in my lap:


NV4500/atlas 3.8:1, old but never been run. got too good of a deal to pass up. just need to buy fluids for it and swap the yokes for Toyota.

I was going to leave the 4.10's in the axles with the sm465 to make the hwy bareable but now I have OD I can use the 5.29 gear sets already in my tool box and move some of the stress off my driveshafts and pinion flange.

I have not looked super close but I am assuming at this point my drivetrain weak link is going to be u joint or pinion flange splines. I guess only time will tell.

 

[Ryan Towry]

not a whole lot done last night but I did get the yokes swapped out for toy flanges. turns out this atlas was built in 2002 so it was still a 26 spline front output and 32 spline rear. luckily WFO down the road had a dana 44 to toy flange that fit the bill perfectly and a 32 spline toy flange for the rear.


also wire wheeled the nv4500 to give it a little paint to keep it from rusting any further.




hopefully this weekend I can pull the motor and get this bolted up and stabbed in. need to rebuild a new cross member now also.

 

[Ryan Towry]

so not as fast getting them swapped as I hoped but that is life.

pulled the motor and trans last night but first had to build a little jack extension to put under the transmission because I was tired of the old stacking of wood block sketchiness.

I used a short piece of axle shaft and a scrap of 1/4" plate to fit on the jack and a tube and angle iron slip on attachment to get the extra height. this seemed a lot more stable than the 4x4's I used to stack on the floor jack to get extra height.




I did get the motor out so now to bolt up the new trans and transfer case and fab a cross member to hold it in place and then get to the links.

 

[74fj40]

Great idea with the jack extension! Definitely going to do that.

 

[Ryan Towry]

Great idea with the jack extension! Definitely going to do that.

thanks, I got the idea from someone else but had to steal it. I did not attach the tube and saddle to the stub so I could make it shorter or longer as needed. the axle piece I used was a 30 spline Toyota section left over from my cut to length nitro shaft and the tube was some 1-1/4" sched 40 I had laying around.

 

[74fj40]

I think I am going to build one with a hitch adapter on it so I can put it in my rear bumper. Thanks for sharing that

 

[Ryan Towry]

engine in the fj40, take 2. This time with the NV4500/ Atlas bolted up.




still need to figure out the right height and build the cross member but I can tell you my engine hoist is glad that is over....
also looks like I only have about 21" for the rear drive shaft with where the axle is now. I am so used to Toyota minitruck stuff where you have miles of rear drive shaft so this makes me really nervous.
I think with the rear leafs I have now I could probably push the axle back another 2-3" before I have to get into mounting the shackles off the back of the frame. do you guys out there in keyboard cowboy land think 24" long for a rear CV shaft? I need to figure angles based on final ride height because this thing is getting lowered a bunch, but 24" sounds short to me.

 

[pjohnson]

I only have about 21" for the rear drive shaft

My rear CV driveshaft is about that long. No problems.

 

[Ryan Towry]

My rear CV driveshaft is about that long. No problems.

thanks for the post! it is reassuring I am not in that bad of shape.

how lifted is your fj40?

 

[pjohnson]

how lifted is your fj40

SOA on stock flat springs. It's an old school design using the stock spring hanger in the front and a tube through the frame for the shackle hanger. Cut-n-turn for the pinion angle and caster. It's probably about 5-6" over stock. I run 37's and rub a little on the inner fender.

 

[Ryan Towry]

SOA on stock flat springs. It's an old school design using the stock spring hanger in the front and a tube through the frame for the shackle hanger. Cut-n-turn for the pinion angle and caster. It's probably about 5-6" over stock. I run 37's and rub a little on the inner fender.

ok cool so you are probably about the same height if not a little higher than I will be so it is a pretty close example.

this makes me a lot more hopeful it will work out....haha

thanks for the info.

 

[Ryan Towry]

not a bunch to report but I finally received my knuckles and FROR keyed histeer arms back and I am pumped!!!! these things are BEEF!


I also purchased some ARP studs for the hi steer arms and the FROR Tacoma brake adapter kit so I can put first gen tundra front brakes on this:

I tried out this "Steel-It" paint given to me by one of our vendors. It is supposed to be super tough and durable and you can weld over the top of it they say. we will see how it works on these knuckles:



in this last picture you can see the machined part on the knuckle so the hi steer arm slides down over the top of the knuckle by roughly 1/4". should help keep some of the strain off of the studs.

 

[Ryan Towry]

I installed the ARP's and the stock bottom studs and then bolted the knuckles on with a temp tie rod to get ready to mock this thing up under the truck.


I think I grossly mis estimated the caster angle I tacked the knuckles on at because the hi steer arms seem turned up really far but hopefully I can get it under the truck where I think ride height will be and turn them to be right and then start getting the link mounts in place.

 

[Ryan Towry]

so a little more done over the weekend.
got the axle rolled under the truck and started planning location. I broke the tacks and rotated the knuckles to 7 degrees caster with the pinion pointed to the t case so it should be closer to actual now. just trying to figure out how far forward and how high to place bump right now.


where I have it in the pictures is about 1" from the tie rod hitting the frame, and the axle is about 4-1/2" forward from stock. If I move it back about 2" I can get the bump higher or I might have to notch the frame. I really want to keep 6" uptravel from ride height and keep it as low as possible for CG reasons.
then I threw on the tires and fenders for some reference and motivation.


she is definitely wide! and I am definitely going to need to do some custom fenders but I am thinking moving the axle back 2" and notching the frame is where I will probably go next, just need to make sure firewall clearance is good for a 40 for possible future growth.
once i get the axle location figured out i plan on building the links backwards of most. i figure i will tack them in place where they fit well then throw those numbers in the calculator and then start massaging from there. i figured there was no reason to come up with link lengths and position in the calculator just to find out they wont work under the truck.

 

[White Stripe]

That's too wide man. if u use wheels with 5 inches of backspacing vs what looks like 2" it will narrow it up a bit.

 

[Ryan Towry]

That's too wide man. if u use wheels with 5 inches of backspacing vs what looks like 2" it will narrow it up a bit.

Yeah to be honest I am not sure on the BS of the rims, they came with the tires when I bought them. I will have to measure one when I take one off.

I don't have a problem with how wide it is. I think it looks wider also because that is close to full bump and at ride height it will not look as wide. if I need I can always swap rims down the road but right now the $$$ is just not there. for reference outside of tire to outside of tire was around 83" so it is not really that wide track width wise. my tan truck was around 94 if I remember correctly but that was also with 42x15-15 TSLs.

I do not really want to go any wider though, will be nice to not need drive over fenders...lol